One of the major lessons I have started to share with start-ups is the need for more collaborations. Why attempt to do it alone in a pretty business-unfriendly environment like ours?
I’d not want to engage those who would be quick to assert that Nigeria has improved on the ease of doing business index. If I must agree, I’d ask by how many points? Today, Rwanda is setting the pace as you can get a business registered between 48 and 72 hours.
We already know ours is a tough environment but rather than complain, we must seek for innovative ways to make things work. I remember having conversations with a few Nigerians who have turned the United States their new homes and are happy to have escaped into a ‘paradise’.
Ironically, Chinese nationals are coming to our country; while we are all eager to seek greener pastures in the Western world, they are happy to come in and occupy. This certainly means there are huge opportunities irrespective of the challenges.
This is basically why my message to start-ups is on the need for greater collaboration. Take a critical look; you’d notice the number of collaborations and mergers happening across board. This is necessitated by the clear fact that industries are being disrupted and times have changed tremendously.
A few days ago, I had a chat with an entrepreneur who complained bitterly about not being unable to get a co-founder developer who would assist in driving the vision and that is because everyone wants to do their own thing.
I believe it is fine for someone to kick-start an idea but at some point, it is important to bring in others with diverse experience so that they can help develop the idea into a formidable business. No one can claim to have monopoly of knowledge. Let me give you some instances.
If you ask anybody about who invented the first telephone that has passed through a lot of revolutions to become handsets and smartphones that we have today, the answer that you will most definitely get without much thinking is Alexander Graham Bell.
Thomas Edison and Elisha Gray were also working on inventing the telephone at the time the breakthrough for Bell came, though. Who knows, if Bell, Edison and Gray had collaborated, the telephone may have been invented earlier than it was.
What many do not even know is that there was a Thomas A. Watson, who was an experienced electrical designer and mechanic who worked closely with Alexander Graham Bell in the — Finish Reading on the Punch
